than the cavalcade, for here might be seen the athletic forms of the sturdy English yeomanry, clothed in the various splendid liveries of their several lords, with the family cognisance embroidered on the bosom and arm, and the banners and banderols of their particular houses carried in the front of each company. Here also was to be seen the picked guard of the King of England, magnificently dressed for the occasion, with the royal banner carried in their centre by the deputy standard bearer, and the banner of their company by their own ancient. In the rear of all, marshalled by officers appointed for the purpose, came the band of those whose rank did not entitle them to take place in the cavalcade, but who had sufficient interest at court to be admitted to the meeting. Though of an inferior class, this company was not the least splendid in the field; for here were all the wealthy tradesmen of the court, habited in many a rich garment, furnished by the extravagance of those that rode before; and many a gold chain hung round their necks, that not long ago had lain in the purse of some prodigal customer.”

But we cease, being fully of opinion with the old chronicler that "to tell the apparel of the ladies, their riche attyres, their sumptuous juelles, their diversities of beauties, and their goodly behaviour from day to day sithe the fyrst metyng, I assure you ten mennes wittes can scarce declare it."

And in a few days, a few short days, all was at an end; and the pomp and the pageantry, the mirth and the revelry, was but as a dream-a most bitter,

indeed, and painful dream to hundreds who had bartered away their substance for the sake of a transient glitter:

"We seken fast after felicite

But we go wrong ful often trewely,

Thus may we sayen alle."

Homely indeed, after the paraphernalia of the "Field of the Cloth of Gold," would appear the homes of England on the return of their masters. For though the nobles had begun to remove the martial fronts of their castles, and endeavoured to render them more commodious, yet in architecture the nation participated neither the spirit nor the taste of its sovereign. The mansions of the gentlemen were, we are told, still sordid; the huts of the peasantry poor and wretched. The former were generally thatched buildings composed of timber, or, where wood was scarce, of large posts inserted in the earth, filled up in the interstices with rubbish, plastered within, and covered on the outside with coarse clay. The latter were light frames, prepared in the forest at small expense, and when erected, probably covered with mud. In cities the houses were constructed mostly of the same materials, for bricks were still too costly for general use; and the stories seem to have projected forward as they rose in height, intercepting sunshine and air from the streets beneath. The apartments were stifling, lighted by lattices, so contrived as to prohibit the occasional and salutary admission of external air. The floors were of clay, strewed with rushes, which often remained for years a receptacle of every pollution.*

* Henry.

tures.

In an inventory of the goods and chattels of Sir Andrew Foskewe, Knight, dated in the 30th year of King Henry the Eighth, are the following furni We select the hall and the best parlour, in which he entertained company, first premising that he possessed a large and noble service of rich plate worth an amazing sum, and so much land as proved him to be a wealthy man ;—

"The hall.-A hangin of greine say, bordered with darneng (or needlework); item a grete side table, with standinge tressels; item a small joyned cuberde, of waynscott, and a short piece of counterfett carpett upon it; item a square cuberde, and a large piece of counterfett wyndowe, and five formes,

&c.

"Perler.-Imprim., a hangynge of greene say and red, panede; item a table with two tressels, and a greyne verders carpet upon it; three greyne verders cushyns; a joyned cupberd, and a carpett upon it; a piece of verders carpet in one window, and a piece of counterfeit carpett in the other; one Flemishe chaire; four joyned stooles; a joyned forme; a wyker skryne; two large awndyerns, a fyer forke, a fyer pan, a payer of tonges; item a lowe joyned stole; two joyned foote-stoles; a rounde table of cipress; and a piece of counterfeitt carpett upon it; item a paynted table (or picture) of the Epiphany of our Lord.

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But notwithstanding this apparent meagreness of accommodation, luxury in architecture was making rapid strides in the land. Wolsey was as magnificent in this taste as in others, as Hampton Court,

*Strutt's Manners and Customs.

" a residence," says Grotius," befitting rather a god than a king," yet remains to attest. The walls of his chambers at York Place, (Whitehall,) were hung with cloth of gold, and tapestry still more precious, representing the most remarkable events in sacred history for the easel was then subordinate to the loom.

The subjects of the tapestry in York Place consisted, we are told, of triumphs, probably Roman; the story of Absalom, bordered with the cardinal's arms; the Petition of Esther, and the Honouring of Mordecai; the History of Sampson, bordered with the cardinal's arms; the History of Solomon; the History of Susannah and the Elders, bordered with the cardinal's arms; the History of Jacob, also bordered; Holofernes and Judith, bordered; the Story of Joseph, of David, of St. John the Baptist; the History of the Virgin; the Passion of Christ; the Worthies; the Story of Nebuchadnezzar; a Pilgrimage; all bordered.

This place-Whitehall-Henry decorated magnificently; erected splendid gateways, and threw a gallery across to the Park, where he erected a tiltyard, with all royal and courtly appurtenances, and converted the whole into a royal manor. This was not until after fire had ravaged the ancient, timehonoured, and kingly palace of Westminster, a place which perhaps was the most truly regal of any which England ever beheld. Recorded as a royal residence as early-almost-as there is record of the existence of our venerable abbey; inhabited by Knute the Dane; rebuilt by Edward the Confessor; remodelled by Henry the Third; receiving lustre

from the residence, and ever-added splendour from the liberality of a long line of illustrious monarchs, it had obtained a hold on the mind which is even yet not passed away, although the ravages of time, and of fire, and the desecrations of subsequent ages, have scarcely left stone or token of the original

structure.

After the fire, however, Henry forsook it. He it was who first built St. James's Palace on the site of an hospital which had formerly stood there. He also possessed, amongst other royal retreats, Havering Bower, so called from the legend of St. Edward receiving a ring from St. John the Evangelist on this spot by the hands of a pilgrim from the Holy Land; which legend is represented at length in Westminster Abbey; Eltham, in Kent, where the king frequently passed his Christmas; Greenwich, where Elizabeth was born; and Woodstock, celebrated for

"the unhappy fate

Of Rosamond, who long ago

Prov'd most unfortunate."

The ancient palace of the Savoy had changed its destination as a royal residence only in his father's time. With the single exception of Westminster— if indeed that-the most magnificent palace which the hand of liberality ever raised, which the finger of taste ever embellished. Various indeed have been the changes to which it has been doomed, and now not one stone remains on another to say that such things have been. Now-of the thousands who traverse the spot, scarce one, at long and far distant intervals, may glance at the dim memories of the past, to think of the plumed knights and high-born